Professional Reviews For This Wine

International Wine Cellar | Rating: 91(+?)

(84% syrah blended with 16% petite sirah): Distinctly musky aromas of dark berries and dark chocolate. Lush, sweet and concentrated, with fine-grained, rather polite dark berry and pepper flavors nicely framed by harmonious acidity. The lightly musky quality adds sex appeal to this very young wine. Finishes with broad, suave tannins and excellent length. This is built to age. (I should note that my first sample of this wine, tasted at the winery, had a more funky muskiness and seemed less sweet than this bottle.)

Author: Stephen TanzerIssue: Issue 156

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Wine Advocate | Rating: 95

The current release, the 2007 Relentless, exhibits a dense purple color as well as notes of grilled herbs, tar, blackberries, cassis, pepper and jus de viande. This full-bodied powerhouse should last at least 15-20 years.

Author: Robert ParkerIssue: 192

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Wine Spectator | Rating: 94

A gorgeous wine, ripe and juicy, with black cherry, plum and currant flavors joined by spicy cedar, graphite, tobacco and dried sage. Full-bodied and powerful, yet retrained and ageworthy. Syrah and Petite Sirah.

Rating: 93
Author:Litig8trTrust Rating:
96Tasted On:
02/02/2013
Very dark and lucious. Black currants, plums and coffee. Full bodied, with a hint of spices on the finish. Great depth and balance, with a long finish.

More Vintages and Sizes of Shafer - Relentless:

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About This Producer

John Shafer began working and replanting steep, rocky vineyards in Napa Valley's Stags Leap District in 1972, and has since built Shafer into one of the most sought-after labels from Napa. John, his son Doug, and winemaker Elias Fernandez call themselves farmers, and are proud of it. Doug took over the vineyards in 1989, and within a year began to integrate organic techniques into his vineyards while the term "organic" still elicited sideways looks. "My soils were getting tired," Doug says. "They had been farmed since 1922." He installed solar panels in 2004, and now enjoys watching his batteries send power back to the grid. Elias was hired by Shafer in 1984 and named winemaker in 1994.
Shafer Hillside Select is a benchmark wine of the Stag's Leap District, with a string of awards too long to list. Aged a full four years prior to release, it is, in the words of Robert Parker, "One of the world's, as well as Napa's, most profound Cabernet Sauvignons."